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Michael Steinhart, Editor in Chief of The Enterprise Cloud Site, went to this year's New York Cloud Expo, and saw only one booth with beguiling, scantily-dressed females trying to attract people to their employers' display. But Michael says one booth with babes was one more than last year, when the same show had no booth babes at all. So we wondered: Are booth babes going away? And if they are, is it because of political consciousness or tight budgets? Since Michael has put more time than we have into thinking about these questions, we fired up our webcam and had a little conversation with him about the future of booth babes at IT conferences and trade shows.

Robin:
I am Robin Miller and we are here today with Michael Steinhart who
recently wrote an article about booth babes, and how in one of the
shows he attended last year there were none, and at the same show
this year one booth had them. So what is that, Michael, you were
even wondering: Is it the economy or is it political consciousness?
What do you think?

Michael:
Well, that is a fantastic question. I have been trying to approach
it from a research-oriented perspective. I reached out to the
company that featured the booth babes this year. This was at the
Cloud Expo Show at the Javits Center. And they said they are
actually I am still waiting for them to get back to me. They
had to do a couple of internal meetings, and then they had to talk
with their brand strategist and they are going to call me as soon as
they get their stories there. But it seems as though they are
falling out of favor.

And just in looking around the Internet and actually
speaking to event organizers which I tried to do in the 20 minutes
since we established that we are going to be talking, it really
sounds as though the tide has turned. One of the general managers for
a big show told me just a couple of minutes ago, that five to ten
years ago, this was okay, but it is not okay anymore. We don’t
want to see them, and audience members don’t want to see them,
and so it lowers the level of the discourse of the show. So that is
the short answer.

And
it also seems as though at least on the one hand, they are starting
to disappear. I found three shows specifically the Infosecurity
Europe Show and then the Associated Press also mentioned the Penny
Arcade Expo which takes place in Seattle and Boston – those
three have officially outlawed booth babes; they don’t allow
them on the show floor.

Robin:
Really? Now last year, a fellow journalist someone you probably know
named Sharon Fisher and I were at Black Hat in Las Vegas, and there
were booth babes whose assets were barely tucked in to the tops of
their dresses or the teeny tops – all over the place. And
quite frankly I was getting sick, so I didn’t want to go
around, so Sharon said,‘Okay I will write that,’ so she
went up and she found dozens and dozens of them. Is that Vegas? Is
that because it is Vegas?

Michael:
I think obviously it is going to depend on the location because I
actually mentioned in the article that in Taipei for example, at the
Computex Show that wrapped up last week, just one particular website
that was dedicated to the booth babes of Computex Taipei.

Robin:
I have seen that more than once in Japan and Taipei, China etc.

Michael:
Right. So the ethos is not gone. It is definitely not going to
disappear overnight. I think it might just be uniquely American
thing, it may be a completely uniquely tech thing, whereas in Vegas,
that happens in Vegas, if it isn’t Vegas it is hard to say, but
I am definitely seeing on the organizers side and also as more women
journalists and more women executives take to the technology take to
the air waves with their complaints there is definitely less
tolerance for it at least in the Western media.

Robin:
Now I live in Florida nowadays, being retired and doing stuff like
this on the side, so the main show that I am most likely to go to is
the annual Gartner thing in Orlando, because it is close – it
is an hour-and-a-half drive. And that has never been a booth babe
show. It has always been like two guys at a table to answer your
technical questions, analysts, it is analysts.

Michael:
Collared shirts.

Robin:
Yeah. And people go out and when they sit down to talk, they don’t
talk, well I might talk with a few friends about the wife and the
kids, but mostly we talk about business. And it is not just because
I am a reporter but everybody does. But I think that might be it,
that might be the economic factors that you mentioned. Do you think,
maybe people are more concerned now than they used to be about
getting every oomph of intelligence or learning out of the show that
they can.

Michael:
Well, I think that’s why people are going to go to a Gartner
show. I went to the Jefferies Investor Conference a couple of months
ago here in New York, and again, yeah, there were no babes, there was
no glitz, there was more excitement. We wanted to hear from the
executives, we want to hear numbers.

Robin:
Do you think that booth babes are about gone or
are they something – are they in history books, are they in
computer museums now and that’s

Michael:
I don’t think they are going to be in computer museums this
year, but if we had the same conversation I would love to have the
same conversation five years from now I have the feeling that they
would be one of those relics of the distant past.

Based on the IT industry here (Ireland) at least, there's been a huge increase in the number of gay men in IT, or out gay men at least. Not much use in having a booth babe if the guy buying the product doesn't like boobs.

The thing is, booth babes aren't there for geeks, they're there for non-geek distributors who are salesmen that probably had a much better relationship with hot girls in school.

That point aside, I think you underestimate how male geeks can be, despite the possibly bad experiences they have had with attractive women. Put enough boobs in the room and even the bitterest of male, heterosexual geeks is going to notice a lot more than they might even let on.

Of course, the world is nothing like it used to be. Geeks used to be outcasts, and now attractive girls whose greatest technological achievement is working their Twitter account and watching Anime regularly call themselves "nerds". You can still be an outcast as a geek, but being a geek no longer makes you an outcast by definition.

Yes, which makes the point even more telling. Girls don't need to adopt a trend to get laid, so if they are doing something like that, they are legitimately enamored with the "nerd"/"geek" label of their own accord. In other words, being a geek doesn't strongly imply virginity any more.

One step further - most of the geeks I grew up with and went to college with (and a great number of the older geeks here at work) have some sort of active recreation or gym regimen and are now dating or married to intelligent and beautiful women. I'd say that except for the most introverted of the subtype, geeks really do end up on top.

Are these really geeks though? I know the terms are changing, but it should still mean more than technologically skilled or a collector of gadgets. A geek should be someone who is socially inept, or does not care at all that people are laughing and will wear glasses that are taped anyway. Sure many geeks are not introverted but what makes them geeks anyway is that their extroversion is not considered cool (trying to show everyone in the school cafeteria the new graphic calculator). Ie the word "geek" co

I disagree. My sex life - such that it is - revolved entirely around females I meet at conferences and shows. I have certain expectations in that I can not actually have genital-on-genital sex, and instead require stimulation via mammary-genital contact, thus I require large breasted females.

Based on the IT industry here (Ireland) at least, there's been a huge increase in the number of gay men in IT, or out gay men at least. Not much use in having a booth babe if the guy buying the product doesn't like boobs.

I've never met a gay man that didn't like boobs. He may not want to have sex with the person they're attached to, but I wouldn't necessarily call that a dislike.

I'm really bothered that this post of mine got modded up, and another that doesn't appear to accidentally endorse sexism got modded down. I'd have a much higher opinion of/. moderators if both got modded down. Then at lease the cause would appear to be me, and not the fact that I don't think of women as pieces of meat.

I hate internet communities so damned much. I don't like "check your privilege" because it takes focus away from the sexism itself, but it's seemingly pretty damn apparent that that's not

well the people complaining about them aren't into the tech or what the booths are about anyways - or what the show is about. but with games, if you have babes and hunks _in_ the games why not at the booth. so people who had nothing to say about the shows just degenerated to writing about boobs because boobs sell. I mean, this video. it's a fucking(not literally) expo and what do we get? some analyzing about fucking(again) props - that's actually totally irrelevant because NYC isn't exactly the boob-babe ca

well the people complaining about them aren't into the tech or what the booths are about anyways

Bullshit. I complain about them. You can't really be more into tech than I am -- it's my career. I, for one, am disgusted by the sexism prevalent in my field. And I can only imagine how much worse it'd be if I was female.

- or what the show is about. but with games, if you have babes and hunks _in_ the games why not at the booth.

Why not remove the grotesque sexist pandering from both the games and the booths?

so people who had nothing to say about the shows just degenerated to writing about boobs because boobs sell.

HURR HURR FEMINISM IS JUST ATTENTION SEEKING

(snip of giant rant about how it's only logical to hire boothbabes if you're hiring anybody at all)

well the people complaining about them aren't into the tech or what the booths are about anyways

Bullshit. I complain about them. You can't really be more into tech than I am -- it's my career. I, for one, am disgusted by the sexism prevalent in my field. And I can only imagine how much worse it'd be if I was female.

Perhaps your mating strategy of grovelling before the collective body of women on the planet in a public and humiliating manner works for you - I certainly don't know how, but lets say it does... the ugly fact is that dominant and powerful men are the most desirable to the majority of women. Grovelers like yourself are attractive to only a very small minority. A few facts you perhaps aren't aware of:

1. You aren't disgusted - you're trying to impress women, and since you don't have any power or influence,

I care because having shit sold to me by the way of sex-appeal just means you think of me like an idiot who is unable to not think with my dick for a few hours at a time. I'd rather not do business with a company that thinks I'm unable to turn off the lizard brain for a bit.

There actually is some backlash against booth babes, but this is evidence of the opposite.

I'm guessing that the editor started with one thought, and skipped over to a completely different train of thought in the middle of writing that summary. And that's why you're supposed to proofread what you post.

That was my initial thought, as well. Upon reflection, however, I suspected that he had modeled the probability of any given booth coming equipped with a booth babe as $ I = I_0\epsilon{-kt}. $ For large $t,$ and assuming $k>0,$ we shouldn't be surprised to find that any given flock of booths have fewer than two equipped booths. That being the case, discovering that $I(t+1)>I(t)$ for some $t$ is insufficient to invalidate the model.

We played a game with the photos of the booth babes from E3, which we called "staff or actress?" Female employees of the company wearing costumes were usually pretty easy to tell - they didn't have model perfect figures, although they were usually fit and attractive AND looked like they could hold their own in a conversation regarding the product in question. The actresses, too, were easy to tell. Did their thighs under the shorty shorts touch? Was their hair bleach blonde and down in loose waves? Did

Speaking of "out of place", they are very much NOT going away at oil industry trade shows. Skimpy bikinis, formal gowns, power suits, they're all there and they all want to sell you heavy machinery. It's almost comical.

...ok did I say that out loud? Anyway, the market will decide. If booths with a couple of local models on deck do better business than booths without, they'd be crazy not to do it. On the other hand, if booth babes are neutral or a liability, they'll (eventually) disappear.

The last trade show I worked, (which was some time ago) the large company with whom I was employed at the time hired two local talent (show was in las vegas) to accompany us during the show. They didn't dress overly provocatively (safari getup, in keeping with the booth theme, no excessive cleavage or leg showing) and they did a good job managing the crowd, making sure we weren't overwhelmed, and taking prospective customer information. Don't get me wrong, they were drop dead gorgeous, but they also knew what they were doing and helped out a lot. "Booth Babe" is a somewhat disparaging term for what can be a difficult job. It's not all about standing in the aisle and doing the "vanna wave" towards the booth.

During a rare slow moment I got to talk to one of the girls, and asked her if she was an employee of our company. (There being a group in the company tasked with handling logistics for these shows, and I at first thought she might be with that group.) She looked shocked, and said no, she was from a local agency, and makes most of her living working booths at trade shows. (Which explains why she was good at it.)

Even women are more likely to want to talk to a well-dressed, attractive woman than the pushy marketdroid or worse, the obese engineer wearing a t-shirt and ripped jeans who smells like he hasn't bathed in a week. It's not just about appearance; it's also about appearance. Know what I mean?

But I wouldn't be surprised if straight women and gay men are more likely to talk to well-dressed attractive men than well-dressed attractive women, which is the real question here. Well that and whether somebody should be making purchasing decisions based on whether the booth person is hot.

You might be surprised. For better or worse, a pretty woman is often seen as less threatening and more approachable than the stereotypical salesperson or "sales engineer" (booth geek) by all genders and sexual orientations. Not just straight men.

But it depends on the context. For instance, if the woman is wearing something appropriate for a trade show, or is merely there to show a lot of skin. Also how she carries herself -- is she really there to help, or merely there as eye candy.

Agreed, the reason for attractive females (or even males) is because it works. Hence why so many of the sales people for whatever industry are charismatic and attractive.

I went to a (somewhat) nearby Ford dealer 2 years ago to start buying a car. I pretty much decided which one I wanted and the specs, I was just seeing how this dealer compared to the other Ford nearby since both were rated well for their repairs/maintenance/etc.

I walk in there are 2 guys and 1 sales woman; the women was a dream. She was h

I was at a recent tech conference and the booth babes were not the ones from Comdex of yesteryear in bikinis. They were hired women who were very attractive but were wearing acceptable clothing. Mostly business casual, slacks and a button down blouse.

IT folks they were not, pretty faces yes. As someone has to scan your badge or hand out a trinket.

Here's the question. If you meet one of these women in the elevator and happen to remember which booth she was working, would you feel confident that you could ask her a question about that company/product and get an informative answer? If yes, they're not booth babes, they're marketing people who happen to be attractive (which certainly helps their career, don't get me wrong). The problem isn't attractive women manning the booths, the problem is when the women are there solely to be attractive (in a very literal sense).

There are more roles in booth work than merely technical. In my experience, the babes (wish there was a better term) were there to manage the crowd, take business cards, hand out literature, funnel people to the sales crew in the right order, and keep them occupied until we were ready to talk to them. These tasks don't require knowledge of the product, they require knowledge of how to handle a crowd.

If you ask a booth babe a technical question, you should get something like "I can take you to someone who

The whole presence of scantily-clad women as a way of attracting attention to your booth assumes that the people whose attention you want to attract are heterosexual males who are inclined to pay attention to your exhibit because there's a scantily-clad woman there. It implicitly assumes that you're not trying to get the interest of/don't care about the opinions of, among others: women, homosexual men, the devoutly religious, etc. In the same way that an ad campaign that includes a of, say, racist caricatures of Asians effectively writes off the Asian population as potential customers (at the very least), this sort of thing writes off whole groups of people who are, you know, actually present in the tech industry. Funny how an industry that supposedly prides itself on evaluating results and actual ability so often tacitly assumes that it is the exclusive domain of straight, white males. It's almost as if cluelessly ignoring the reality of privilege, racism, sexism, and heteronormativity leads to cluelessly privileged, racist, sexist, heteronormative behavior.

Its not just about sex. Its about hiring some attractive people to represent your company. Because your engineers are probably unshaved smelly cave dwellers that probably don't make a good impression at conventions. So how do you make your engineer or software developer seem credible? Put a 21 year old aspiring model next to him that smiles and makes eyes at everyone that gets near the booth.

Is it dumb? No more dumb then the people buying your products. Which isn't an insult against them... people are just like that. Get over it. We're not robots. We're semi intelligent social opportunistic primates. And even women like having attractive women around.

Open a women's magazine. What do you see? Is it lots of half naked men? Nope... half naked women.

As to getting the attention of gay men... All respect, but they're by definition a minority. Were they not the species itself would be in some trouble. So while it might make some sense to reach out to any demographic, the reality is that its probably a marginal issue at best.

All of that said, possibly there is something to be said for not having such aggressive marketing at conventions. Rather, put your unshaved cave dweller out there sans smiling boobs... and just see what happens.

It will either be fine or it won't. And we'll learn something either way.

With respect, I'm no feminist, but the question here isn't whether sex is effective at selling. It certainly is. The question is the residual effects of using women's bodies in that way. Does it contribute to certain attitudes that could be negative for women?

I'm not really going to go farther down that path, because again, I begin rolling my eyes as some of the more insane feminist bullshit out there, but like any good thing, I wonder if using sex in that manner can have negative consequences, if done outside of moderation.

As a woman, it's friday at down here and for work today I am wearing dark jeans, high top sneakers, a Dr Who T-shirt, I had short (though coloured) hair and am wearing no make up. I don't consider myself a tom boy and get flirted with plenty. I'm also on the cuddly side as far as size goes.

And you're also reading and commenting on Slashdot. In other words, you're not the typical woman.

We're human beings. We're going to use sex to sell. We've been doing it for tens of thousands of years. Best get over that.

Think only women's bodies are used? Men's bodies are used as well. And not just men's bodies but the masculine mystique. The whole tough guy, macho man... thing. And do you see men complain about that even though its easily as exploitive of male psychology as female swimsuit issue? No.

Because men understand that's just reality. Women like it. And men therefore want to be it. It gains th

Men are men. Our attention is drawn to curves. We can act respectful, but can't deny biology.

"But Michael says one booth with babes was one more than last year"

If everyone has booth babes then the incremental effect of one company adding booth babes is about ZERO. You can be at booth A and still see B, C, D, E....If no one has booth babes then the incremental effect of one company adding booth babes is significant.

If no one has booth babes then the incremental effect of one company adding booth babes is significant.

Perhaps, but one booth is still only one booth. Its significance to me would be more likely to be shown if that booth had them next year, and then one or two more exhibitors joined them.

One booth at the beginning of a trend is groundbreaking. One booth of something that never gets any traction is just some doofus who brought girls in tight clothes and got nothing out of it. In other words, the value of being that one booth only has historical value.

I like looking at booth babes as much as the next guy, but c'mon. It's just unprofessional. And frankly, I don't want to talk to a hired salesmodel at an IT conference, either. I want to talk to a technical person who knows the freaking product and can answer detailed technical questions about it. If I wanted a brochure, I'd go to the website. It's a waste of my time and your money to have anyone in your booth that doesn't know the product inside and out.

I like looking at booth babes as much as the next guy, but c'mon. It's just unprofessional. And frankly, I don't want to talk to a hired salesmodel at an IT conference, either. I want to talk to a technical person who knows the freaking product and can answer detailed technical questions about it. If I wanted a brochure, I'd go to the website. It's a waste of my time and your money to have anyone in your booth that doesn't know the product inside and out.

look man, it's useless.

talking to an attractive salesmodel is a lot better than talking to some dude who a) doesn't know shit about the product of the company and b) feels like he's hitting on you due to his script. the techies rarely are at the booths, they're either having a good time or in meetings - occupying the booth is a bottom of the barrel job for techies. the booths are actually just a sideshow to the actual show of having the industry people in one place at one time. the booths are meaningless fo

I like looking at booth babes as much as the next guy, but c'mon. It's just unprofessional. And frankly, I don't want to talk to a hired salesmodel at an IT conference, either. I want to talk to a technical person who knows the freaking product and can answer detailed technical questions about it. If I wanted a brochure, I'd go to the website. It's a waste of my time and your money to have anyone in your booth that doesn't know the product inside and out.

...but there's generally only one or two of those, and they may be occupied. The babe can hand out literature, swag, or do smalltalk until the salescreature can see you. This is a valuable resource.

It is an IT conference, it is not supposed to be professional. Professional is for offices and meetings, this is just a cluster-fuck advertising event.Who is going to talk business in front of all of your competitors and 10 thousand other people, on the spur of the moment, in a room louder than a circus, when the person you are trying to talk to needs to look after 100 other interested onlookers?

Ok, yes they are. But they certainly are not scantily clad. The one on the right might be attempting a provocative stance. Or she just stands that way.

'Wonder what the funky eye makeup is supposed to mean?

I may as well fess up: I've never really liked trade shows. I don't "get" them. I haven't been to one in several years. Maybe it's because my Live-In Booth Babe for the last 22 years is also my best friend and I'd rather go for a hike with her.

my first thought was of Jen in the I.T. crowd [youtube.com] getting the task of "entertaining" the visiting executives...

Second thought is that "good marketing" is also a great way to quickly kill a bad product - if your product doesn't "perform" (choose a metric any metric) then "good marketing" will have the unintended consequence of letting a lot of people find out that your product is worthless. These people will "get the word out" and ipso facto - yadda yadda yadda - good bye product/company

#1) Booth babes are offensive to the larger population of women, even in the tech industry, there are more and more women present compared to say... the 1990's where it was almost 100% male dominated. In fact, there was a recent story about a female journalist harassed at E3 because it was just assumed by some that any woman at a gaming convention must be 'meat'.

#2) They are as clueless as their looks would lead you to believe. I remember being at a Motorcycle convention, and while that was once a male dominated event, the new market for motorcycles is now women -- but I digress... at the "Vespa" booth (Vespa, of all places, scooters appeal to women!), we had a question about some seriously radical Vespa merchandise (I think I was a cool looking leather bag, or a jacket), and I go to ask what I thought was a saleswoman, but she didn't know anything about what it was or how to buy it, even though she was dressed in Vespa branded attire. Point is; I was interested; but they lost a sale because the lady was apparently hired as decoration, but wasn't trained to even point me to a real salesperson!

I go to ask what I thought was a saleswoman, but she didn't know anything about what it was or how to buy it, even though she was dressed in Vespa branded attire. Point is; I was interested; but they lost a sale because the lady was apparently hired as decoration, but wasn't trained to even point me to a real salesperson!

If she had pointed to a salesperson, would having her there no longer been offensive?

Booth babes (of either sex and orientation) are a red flag that the company you are dealing with would like to grab your attention using the nether regions of your body rather than engaging your mind with a fantastic product. Easy tip off that they are more interested in flash over substance that will leave one looking foolish for having selected their product.

In surveys conducted in 2002 and 2011, pollsters at Gallup found that members of the American public massively overestimated how many people are gay or lesbian. In 2002, a quarter of those surveyed guessed upwards of a quarter of Americans were gay or lesbian (or "homosexual," the third option given). By 2011, that misperception had only grown, with more than a third of those surveyed now guessing that more than 25 percent of Americans are gay or lesbian. Women and young adults were most likely to provide high estimates, approximating that 30 percent of the population is gay. Overall, "U.S. adults, on average, estimate that 25 percent of Americans are gay or lesbian," Gallup found. Only 4 percent of all those surveyed in 2011 and about 8 percent of those surveyed in 2002 correctly guessed that fewer than 5 percent of Americans identify as gay or lesbian.

They probably became sexist about the time that they're trying to sell video games with unrelated tits. Not that I care if they want to do that, but I'd say that if you wanted to meet an example of "blatantly using sex to sell unrelated stuff," this would be one of those times.

So, yeah, if you're selling the latest hentai-based video game, they're right on topic. When you are selling Call of Duty? Not so much.

Holy shit! I hadn't even started the video until reading your comment, but I am shocked and appalled that there is a background of cats behind this douche in the video. I didn't watch the whole thing, but skipped through enough to see that there were no booth babes in the video! Why would I want to watch this video about booth babes, when there are none in the video?